The Trinitarianism of Ephesians 4:4-6, a Chiastic Creed

A few daring theologians in our day are carefully teasing out some of the “Trinitarian metaphysics” from especially certain creedal and doxological New Testament passage, not least Tom Wright and Peter Leithart.  This is not new, though.

St. Irenaeus, in Demonstration of Apostolic Preaching, quotes in part Ephesians 4:4—6, which reads:

There is one body and one Spirit—just as you were called to the one hope that belongs to your call—one Lord, one faith, one baptism, one God and Father of all, who is over all and through all and in all.

From this text, he concludes, “...because ‘above all’ is the Father, and ‘through all’ is the Word—since through Him everything was made by the Father—while ‘in us all’ is the Spirit, who cries ‘Abba, Father,’ and forms man to the likeness of God” (I:5). 

Granted, within this creedal remark of St. Paul, Irenaeus picks up on the unmistakable Trinitarian formula, “One Spirit...one Lord (Jesus)...one God and Father.”  What is interesting, and certainly out of sorts with much of the rationalistic exegesis common this side of the Enlightenment, is that Irenaeus continues his Trinitarian reasoning throughout the following three prepositional phrases of verse six.  Before we dismiss Irenaeus’ exegesis as a byproduct of the old quadriga, the four-folded methodology, or some other highly subjective approach, judged through our modernistic rationalism, we should revisit St. Paul.

When we return to the text, we find an interesting chiasmus, which would point to the same conclusion that Irenaeus so naturally draws.  Look at the structure of this creed.

4:4       A. One Spirit

4:5              B. One Lord (Jesus)

4:6a                   C. One...Father

4:6b                   C. Over all

                   B. Through all

            A. In all

Granting that this text is likely a creedal formula, and that it is naturally structured in terms of a chiasm, I for one tend to think that Irenaeus’ Trinitarian conclusion is spot one.  It is further supported by the patristics’ hermeneutical key, the regulae fidei, the creedal Rule of Faith, which Irenaeus stresses in the early sections of the same work. 

Our ancient fathers in the faith did not pretend or deceive themselves into believing that they came to the text without any pre-drawn conclusions, much less without having a deep, deep precommitment.  Neither did they strive to recognize their precommitments so as to avoid them during exegesis, which all our hermeneutical textbooks caution us to do.  Rather the singular precommitment that ruled exegesis—sometimes for better or worse—was the regulae fidei, which matured into what we know today as the Apostle’s Creed.  For them, a robust Trinitarianism was the presupposition of all exegesis (and all of life), not merely its conclusion.  Perhaps we should put our fathers’ landmark back where we found it (Prov. 22:28).  Thankfully, some are.

St. Irenaeus on Lent—Its Diversity and Unity among the Faithful: A Good Word for the Modern Dilemma

For the controversy is not merely as regards the [paschal] day, but also as regards the form itself of the fast.  For some consider themselves bound to fast one day, others two days, other still more, while others do so during forty...And this variety among the observers of the fasts had not its origin in our time [i.e., mid-second century A.D.], but long before in that of our predecessors, some of whom probably, being not very accurate in their observance of it, handed down to posterity the custom as it had, through simplicity or private fancy, been introduced among them.  And yet nevertheless all these lived in peace one with another, and we also keep peace together.  Thus, in fact, the difference in observing the fast establishes the harmony of our common faith.

                                        —St. Irenaeus, Fragments from the Lost Writings of Irenaeus, III.

Is Genesis 3:15 really the “Protevangelium”?

AN INTRODUCTION AND EARLY CHURCH FATHERS, “YES”

That Gen 3:15 is the Protevangelium has traditionally been the understanding of the text since the earliest days of the church. The writings of Justin Martyr provide an early example of the traditional interpretation.

For Eve, being a virgin and undefiled, conceiving the word that was from the serpent, brought forth disobedience and death; but the Virgin Mary, taking faith and joy, when the Angel told her the good tidings, that the Spirit of the Lord should ... overshadow her, and therefore the Holy One that was born of her was Son of God, answered, "Be it done to me according to Thy word.”

It was Irenaeus, however, that galvanized the concept of Gen 3:15 as the Protevangelium, that is, as the first announcement of the gospel.

Christ has therefore, in His work of recapitulation, summed up all things, both waging war against our enemy, and crushing him who had at the beginning led us away captives in Adam, and trampled upon his head, as thou can perceive in Genesis that God said to the serpent, 'And I will put enmity between thee and the woman, and between thy seed and her seed; He shall be on the watch for thy head, and thou on the watch for his heel.' For from that time, He who should be born of a woman, namely from the Virgin, after the likeness of Adam, was preached as keeping watch for the head of the serpent. This is the seed of which the apostle says in the Letter to the Galatians, 'that the law of works was established until the seed should come to whom the promise was made (Gal 3:19).' This fact is exhibited in a still clearer light in the same Epistle where he thus speaks: 'But when the fullness of time was come, God sent forth His Son, made of a woman (Gal 4:4).' For indeed, the enemy would not have been fairly vanquished, unless it had been a man born of a woman who conquered him. For it was by means of a woman that he got the advantage over man at first, setting himself up as man's opponent. And therefore does the Lord profess Himself to be the Son of man, comprising in Himself that original man out of whom the woman was fashioned, in order that, as our species went down to death through a vanquished man, so we may ascend to life again through a victorious one; and as through a man death received the palm of victory against us, so again by a man we may receive the palm against death.

It could be argued that the singularity of the woman’s seed—over against the collective interpretation of the noun—actually antedates the church fathers, and is likely influenced by their reading of Gen 3:15 in the LXX, which has “seed” (sperma) in 3:15 in the singular (spermatos).

AN EXAMPLE FROM THE REFORMATION PERIOD: JOHN CALVIN, “NO; BUT, YES”

Reading the woman’s seed as singular and Christological has suffered under the scrutiny of scholarship during the modern period. Calvin, for instance, initially takes the pronouncement on the serpent and the subsequent enmity between the respective seeds etiologically, and so explaining the dread of snakes in man. Calvin states, “I interpret this simply to mean that there should always be hostile strife between the human race and serpents; for, by a secret feeling of nature, man abhors them.” Although Calvin goes on to rightly read that Satan in back of the serpent and consequently the threatening curse is directed at him, he still dissents from the Christological interpretation, and thus from the traditional Protevangelium. He says, “There is, indeed, no ambiguity in the words here used by Moses; but I do not agree with others respecting their meaning; for other interpreters take the seed for Christ, without controversy; as if it were said, that some one would arise from the seed of the woman who should wound the serpent’s head.”

Calvin’s primary objection to the traditional view of the text is that it requires one to severely distort the noun “seed” (Heb. zera‛); they take it as singular when, for Calvin, it is transparently collective. “I explain, therefore, the seed to mean the posterity of the woman generally.” From the painful experience that not all the woman’s seed, “in general,” overcome the serpent, Calvin moves toward a theological conclusion on the basis of NT passages that are less than carefully handled in the text of the Genesis commentary. This conclusion rests on Calvin’s Federalism, with Christ as the Federal Head. Calvin’s position on the text and the doctrine was succinctly replicated by the even abler exegesis of Geerhardus Vos in the middle of the last century.

It appears, therefore, that for Calvin the Protevangelium cannot be the result of a careful interpretation of Gen 3:15; the Protevangelium is, however, a theological doctrine, which may be deduced by the science of dogmatics.

A CONTEMPROARY SAMPLING: JOHN WALTON, “NO; AND, NO”

Walton, like Calvin (and many others), understands the noun “seed” as collective in Gen 3:15. Walton admits that the evidence for either view is ambiguous, but believes that “If we explore the text in light of the author’s intention and the initial audience’s understanding, it is difficult to see how they would conclude that the text foretells the coming of a single person (seed) who would bring victory.” Furthermore, Walton does not believe that the text offers any hope of either side of the respective seed gaining an advantage or victory in the struggle, but that “the verse is depicting a continual, unresolved conflict between humans and the forces of evil.” So, Walton not only departs from the traditional interpretation of the singular sense of the “Seed,” but strides further from the traditional understanding in arguing that Gen 3:15 does not even contain a germ of hope for the seed’s eventual victory; the text presents only trouble for humanity, continual and unresolved trouble.

Walton observes that grammatically the noun “seed” can have a singular pronoun attached to it, e.g., “he will crush,” while still referring to a collective or corporate posterity. “Therefore, when the text says that he will crush your head, grammar cannot determine whether this is a reference to the corporate seed or one representative from among the descendants.”

Regarding the nature of the conflict, Walton argues from the root verb, šwp; and, since the action of the respective parties share this root, nothing indicates that one side or the other will gain the upper hand in the struggle. The KJV, NAS, and ESV respectably translate the verb as “bruise” in both instances, thus maintaining the Hebrew sense in the English text. The NIV, however, appears to allow the traditional interpretation to color its translation by ascribing to the serpent a “crush” to the head, and the woman’s seed a “strike” to the heel; crush clearly reflects more finality than does strike in the context. Even granting that the offensive blows are to be taken as similar or even as the same does not settle the matter. The anatomical parts mentioned, which receive the blows, must also be considered. Surely, a bruised head will fall to a bruised heel, or will it?

Walton says, No; both attacks are potentially mortal, so neither the head-strike nor the heel-strike tells us anything about the final outcome of the struggle. Rather, “both sides are exchanging potentially mortal blows of equal threat to the part of the body most vulnerable to their attack.”

Walton, therefore, directly denies the traditional interpretation that Gen 3:15 provides us with the Protevangelium. Actually, Walton’s conclusions imply that Gen 3:15 does not contain any hint of good news, only continual trouble.

ANOTHER CONTEMPORARY SAMPLING: JACK COLLINS, “YES”

A 1997 article by Jack Collins has shed some light on our question, and has ‘bruised the head’ of the collective interpretation of “seed” in Gen 3:15. Collins’ observations have obvious implications for the doctrine of the Protevangelium (Collins does recognize that these implications are beyond the purview of his note, and thus does not flesh them out).

Most who find the Messianic promise in Gen 3:15 do not deny that the grammar is ambiguous; Collins is no exception. Collins takes serious the LXX translation of the Hebrew. He believes that the use of the neuter singular sperma (“seed”), and the masculine singular pronoun autos (“he”), translating hû' is significant. The mismatch between the gender of the noun and the antecedent pronoun indicates a meaningful intention on the part of the LXX translators, one that is clearly messianic, and one that is looking forward to a singular figure. For Collins, it represents an “interpretation” of the Hebrew that is reflected in the doctrine, Protevangelium.

Collins surveys every (personal) use of zera‛ in the Brown-Driver-Briggs lexicon, with an eye on the syntactical patterns that surround both the collective uses of zera‛ and the instances that have a strictly singular use. He tabulates the behavior of the verb inflections, pronouns and adjectives associated with the noun. The results are that “when zera‛ denotes ‘posterity’ the pronouns (independent pronouns, object pronouns, and suffixes) are always plural.”

Contrariwise, “when zera‛ denotes a specific descendant, it appears with singular verb inflections, adjectives, and pronouns.” Collins also observes that “The pattern for the Greek translations of these passages is identical (at least in the Pentateuch and Former Prophets, where the translation is generally of higher quality, and to the extent it is possible to see a distinction).” He concludes, “from these data it becomes clear that, on the syntactical level, the singular pronoun hû' in Genesis 3:15 is quite consistent with the pattern where a single individual is in view…The evidence of the Greek translator of Genesis 3:15 meant to convey that an individual was promised; this study indicates that his interpretation is consistent with Hebrew syntax elsewhere in the Bible.”

Collins’ study does not in itself provide apodictic certainty that Gen 3:15 is the Protevangelium, but it does go a long way towards an exegetical case for the doctrine from the text of Genesis. The “seed” in Gen 3:15 is singular; and if that is the case, the text points to a particular descendant who will decisively defeat the work of the serpent, while suffering greatly in the struggle for victory.

PERSONAL OBSERVATIONS AND PERSPECTIVE ON THE PROTEVANGELIUM

If, as Collins’ note demonstrates, we are not compelled to understand the “seed” of Gen 3:15 as a collective term denoting general posterity, then we may legitimately conclude that Moses had a singular figure in mind. Although historical theology is not the determining factor in ambiguous texts, it is, nevertheless, somewhat authoritative and something we should be in humble conversation with. The early fathers, encouraged by the LXX interpretation of the Hebrew text of Gen 3:15, as well as significant NT allusions, almost unanimously understood Genesis to be teaching the Protevangelium. Their historical and spatial proximity to the authority of the apostolic ministry cannot be overlooked, neither should it be underestimated. Therefore, as heirs of the fathers, we are to see Jesus Messiah in the promised head-stomping “Seed” of Gen 3:15.

With respect to Calvin’s commentary on the subject, we may be confident yet cautious. If Collins’ analysis is correct, then Calvin and others who take a collective sense of the noun in Gen 3:15 were overlooking significant data. Therefore, we may decline Calvin’s view that the noun is collective; rather, it is singular. We may, however, embrace the theological genius of Calvin and his careful handling and calculation of the doctrine of federal headship.

We can surely appreciate Walton’s desire for discovering the author’s and the audience’s original understanding of the meaning of Gen 3:15. Walton, however, seems to overlook the fact that Moses was writing and the original audience was reading Gen 3:15 as a post-exodus and post-Sinai people. In other words, in order to discover the original meaning of Gen 3:15 one must read it as it was written—read it in terms of the rest of the context of Genesis and the Torah. The micro-grammatical, hair-splitting exegesis that makes viable the precision analysis represented by Collins’ note is itself something foreign to the literary context of Moses; our methodology itself is largely anachronistic. While words and language were radically treasured by ancient Hebrews (that is, after all, a very important way in which Yahweh reveals himself to his people—our God speaks), their understanding of them is nuanced quite differently than ours is.

For instance, Paul, whose masterful interpretation of Torah must shape our own, understood zera‛ in Genesis as singular and meaning Christ (cf. Gal 3:16). Whose hermeneutical method has greater authority? Should we follow Paul’s typological reading or the modern-critical, post-Enlightenment methodology?

Did other ancients read a singular figure in Gen 3:15? It seems quite likely. For Stephen, and doubtless many others, understood Moses himself to be a proto-typal deliverer like the one promised in Gen 3:15, saying of him, “that God was giving them salvation (sōtēria) by his hand” (Acts 7:25). Additionally, we can get a sense of hope in the words of Eve when Cain is born (Gen 4:1). However, Cain’s murder of Abel occasioned Seth’s replacement of the “seed.” Again, Eve’s words are telling, “God has appointed for me another offspring instead of Abel, for Cain killed him” (v 25). In this verse, we find a word-play on the name of the new son, Seth. “Seth” (shêth) sounds very similar to “appointed” (shı̂yth), and Seth’s “appointment” as the replacement “offspring” (zera‛) provides the ground for his name. Finally, we should note that “appointed” in 4:25 translates the same word in the Hebrew that is behind the “put” in 3:15. “Put” is in reference to the divinely established “enmity” that Yahweh “put” (shı̂yth) between the woman’s seed and that of the serpent’s. Seth, therefore, represents a singular figure of hope in reference to the “offspring” of the woman in the earliest chapters of Genesis.

All this to say, the Bible—the whole of all the parts—is a covenantal and confessional document; it all points to Jesus Messiah as its ultimate subject and object. One committed to Jesus, therefore, cannot read Genesis (or any other book in Scripture) as though he, the Messiah, has not come at all. There is a sense in which text’s meanings morph after subsequent texts and/or events develop in their stream. This is especially true with messianic promise-fulfillment motifs. Hosea originally recounted Yahweh’s faithfulness in the then-past exodus event with the words, “Out of Egypt I called my son” (Hos 2:15). Jesus’ advent changed those words forever (cf. Matt 2:15)! So, as Paul said of the “seed” elsewhere in Genesis, in 3:15 also, the Seed…”who is Christ.” Genesis 3:15 is the Protevangelium.

IRENAEUS: ADAM, CHRIST, AND REDEMPTIVE HISTORY

I love patrology (i.e., the study of the early Church Fathers); I love apologetics; I love good theology, and I love a redemptive-historical view of the Bible, one that holds Jesus high and centered. These are just a few reasons why I love Irenaeus and his works.

Reading the patristics often requires a critical eye. Few early Church fathers were thoroughly orthodox in their theology, oftimes, being influenced by their heritage and saturation in Platonism and the spirit of the age. With Irenaeus, however, one may relax and enjoy. His mind and subsequently his theology were radically transformed by the Rule of Faith (i.e., the essential gospel) and a Christological reading of all the Scriptures.

James Dennison, Jr. has written an insightful piece titled “Irenaeus and Redemptive History”, which covers Irenaeus and his redemptive-historical hermeneutic, particularly the “recapitulation” theme. Something very central to Irenaeus’ eschatology, Christology, anthropology, and soteriology—in a word all his theology.

John Walton on the use of the plural pronouns in Gen 1:26

I recently received John Walton’s NIV Application Commentary on Genesis from a good friend. Apart from a general dislike for the structural format of the series, the content has been both extremely insightful and bewildering at the same time.

Every one has their “thing,” their particular emphasis and specialty. Of course, Walton’s thing is ancient Near Eastern (ANE) background comparative studies. Walton’s emphasis provides us with fruitful reference material, which helps us to transcend our cultural situatedness and read the text of the OT through the lenses of reconstructed elements of an ANE paradigm. Walton’s contributions in this respect shine through in his part in the IVP Bible Background Commentary: Old Testament.

I’ve found times, however, in his Genesis commentary that this emphasis becomes so axiomatic for Walton that, the comparative analysis is held at the expense of the straight forward teaching in other biblical passages, not least the ones that are authoritatively interpreting the various Genesis texts he’s considering. Genesis 1:26 is a case in point.

Walton affords two-plus pages to the use of plural pronouns in reference to God in Gen 1:26 (i.e., “Let us...in our image”; see pp. 128—30). Walton sets forward three lines of reasoning used to deal with this anything but uncontroversial topic: 1) theological, 2) grammatical, and 3) cultural. The cultural perspective is later qualified as offering two differing veins, one of which is Walton’s preferred resolution for the plurals. Walton defines these three categories as follows:

1. Theological: The plurals are explained as an expression of the plurality within the Godhead, either specifically of the Trinity or at least as a recognition of the two persons represented by the creator God (elohim) and the Holy Spirit of verse 2.

2. Grammatical: The plurals are explained as an expression of grammatical or rhetorical conventions, including self-deliberation, plural of majesty, and grammatical agreement with the plural elohim.

3. Cultural: The plurals are explained against the background of ancient Near Eastern culture.

One of the cultural interpretive options is that the plurals represent a vestige of polytheism. Walton rightly dismisses this option out of hand, as it is the result of heterodox presuppositions that he (and most other students of the Bible) simply can’t adopt. The grammatical option even less attention before dismissal.

Granting the ANE background and other OT text such as 1 Kings 22:19—22; Is 14:13, and Job 1, Walton concludes that the cultural view that assumes the plurals are to be understood as representing a “heavenly court” comprised of angels is the best case hypothesis for reading Gen 1:26.

Walton’s positive conclusion notwithstanding, my concern with his handling of this verse is in connection with his dismissal of the theological reading of the plurals.

He begins by admitting that, “the theological is probably the most popular in traditional circles...” I’m sorry, but given the contemporary attitude towards anything “traditional,” this reads as poisoning the well—he has bent the reader toward his conclusion prior to hearing his argument, if, that is, the reader doesn’t understand themselves to be part of the “traditional circle.” Today, it is almost unanimous consensus that if something is coming from a traditional perspective, it is necessarily wrong or at very least needs serious questioning.

In addition, the statement reads as if the theological reading is held only by those in “traditional circles,” or in other words, modern “traditionalists,” a.k.a, anti-intellectual fundamentalists. How it ought to read, though, is that the theological view of Gen 1:26 comes not from a traditional “circle” but rather a long “line” of tradition. The theological reading has a sustained pedigree throughout the orthodox hermeneutical tradition.

For instance, if the Epistle of Barnabas sheds any light on the apostolic interpretation of this verse, then the following is significant. “For the Scripture says concerning us, while he speaks to the Son, ‘Let Us make man...’” (Barn., VI). Likewise, Irenaeus has this: “[T]he Son and Holy Spirit, to whom He says, ‘Let Us make man’” (AH, IV, Preface: 4). And again, “[T]he Son and Spirit, by whom and in whom...He made all things, to whom He also speaks, saying, ‘Let Us make man...’” (AH, IV:XX:1). Furthermore, Tertullian, in his treatise Against Marcion, says the same. “Since then he is the image of the Creator (for He, when looking on Christ His Word, who was to become man, said, ‘Let Us make man...’)” (Ch. VIII).

These men are not reading Gen 1:26 through highly developed, post-Nicene Christological/Trinitarian lenses; a charge that might be laid at the doorstep of Calvin, who concludes thus in his commentary of Genesis, “Christians, therefore, properly contend, from this testimony, that there exists a plurality of Persons in the Godhead. God summons no foreign counsellor; hence we infer that he finds within himself something distinct; as, in truth, his eternal wisdom and power reside within him.”

From these examples, the “traditional circle” boasts a 2000 year circumference; from the best minds in the faith, the theological view was the Patrological view and the Reformational view of the plurals in Gen 1:26. Shall we then throw this to the wind?

This, of course, provokes a question: How much authority ought ecclesiastical tradition and historical theology exercise over our hermeneutical practice today? Historically, Protestants, in response to the absolutism of the Romish doctrine of papal authority, have tended to overreact and do their interpretation in a vacuum. This attitude has been heightened and exaggerated by the individualistic and autonomous spirit resident in the various independent-fundamentalists movements of the 20th century, which scathes any tradition as being the “traditions of men” (as though they are not constructing a tradition of their own!).

Such an attitude is unwise at best (literally). And it seems that Walton shares some measure of this attitude toward the authority of our historical interpretive heritage.

Walton continues.

“[I]f we ask what the Hebrew author and audience understood, any explanation assuming plurality in the Godhead is easily eliminated. If the interpreter wishes to bypass the human author with the claim that God’s intention is what is important, there are large obstacles to hurdle. If divine intention is not conveyed by the human author, where is it conveyed?”

This last sentence begs some attention. The question seems loaded and rhetorical to me. If we answer this question with any dual agency theory, Walton has framed it so it would seem that we’re disparaging authorial intent (and adopting a quasi-dictation idea of inspiration). This works, however, only is we accept his equivocation.

Here Walton seems to be equivocating the terms “understood” and “conveyed.” This appears to me to be the only way for his argument to work. For if we take the terms to denote their usual lexical sense, then limiting our conclusions to what the human author and his contemporaries understood would eliminate not only plurality in the Godhead, but divine intention altogether, reducing the Bible to a monument of human literary genius. On the other hand, of course, we’re obligated to subscribe to the idea that the divine intention is conveyed (or carried through, communicated by, et cetera). However, it does not follow from the fact that the author’s own words are the vehicle of divine intent to the notion that the divine intention of the author’s words are strictly bound by the cultural categories and plausibility structure of the author and his contemporaries. This, though, is exactly what I believe Walton’s remarks “convey.”

Moreover, if the divine intention is constricted to the paradigmatic understanding of the author/audience, then what we commonly understand as “progressive revelation,” the organic escalation of God’s Self-disclosure in Scripture, is dependant on and subordinate to the cultural and sociological developments of ANE civilization. I believe this conclusion is as unavoidable as it is heterodox.

Finally, Walton says:

“Certainly, if the New Testament told us that the Trinity was referred to in this verse, we would have no trouble accepting that as God’s intention. But it is not enough for the New Testament to affirm that there is such a thing as the Trinity. That affirmation does not prove that the Trinity is referred to in Genesis 1:26. Without specific New Testament treatment, we have no authoritative basis for bypassing the human author.”

I’m inclined to respond to these remarks with tongue in cheek...

“Certainly, Mr. Walton, if the NT explicitly told us that ANE comparative analysis was the most proper means of extracting the divine intention from the OT texts, then we’d have no trouble accepting the primacy you afford the method. That modernistic methods like this exist, and can be brought to bear on the text of Scripture (working on the presupposition that the Bible is ordinary literature!), is not enough to convince us. Without specific NT use of this method, we have no authoritative basis for bypassing the Christological-Canonical reading used by the NT authors.”

The truth in this jest is this: Walton rightly appeals to later revelation, particularly that later than the Advent of Christ, Who is the Sum and Finale of God’s revelation to mankind, in order to establish an “authoritative basis” for the theological view. He believes there is none, so... But this seems like special pleading, since Walton has no NT basis for allowing ANE background analysis to be the final determiner in discovering the divine intention in the reading of Gen 1:26.

In Lk 24:25ff, the two on the road to Emmaus are upbraided by Jesus for their reading of the OT. “O foolish ones, and slow of heart to believe all that the prophets have spoken! Was it not necessary that the Christ should suffer these things and enter into his glory? And beginning with Moses (i.e., Genesis) and all the Prophets, he interpreted to them in all the Scriptures the things concerning himself...Then he opened their minds to understand the Scriptures.” Further, Paul teaches that an Old Covenant reading that does not presuppose Christ is a “veiled” reading.

Does not, then, the NT train us to always take a Christ-first, theological reading, lest we too are “slow of heart to believe”?

And what of the logic of the NT? The NT presents Christ as the uncreated Creator, through whom all things, including man, were made. Moreover, the image-restoration texts (esp. Eph 4:24 and Col 3:10) teach us not only the essential attributes lost in the Fall, but also their recovery; our salvation is a progressive recreating into that originally good image of God in us, through the work of Christ and the Holy Spirit. Thus, without any self-consciousness of inconsistency, Paul presents us with the clear teaching in the renown ordo salutis, Rom 8:28--30, that our salvific reshaping is into the image of the Son. And John, when we shall inherit our full redemption, the resurrection and perfection of our bodies, 1 Jn 3:2. Good and necessary deduction from the NT data offers the very thing Walton claims is not there.

Nevertheless, beyond the logic of the NT, what about the explicit texts, such as Jn 1:1—3, Col 1:15f, and Heb 1:1—3? Where else did the early Church fathers get the notion that the plurals of Gen 1:26 were an intra-Trinitarian discourse? For Walton to claim that because these texts don’t explicitly read “Gen 1:26 is Uni-Plural Divine dialogue,” we must suspend judgment is unfair; for using the same rationale, he’d also have to suspend judgment that even there exists such a thing as the Trinity, since the NT doesn’t say so according to the rigors of his expectations.

So, while I’m finding some of Walton’s gleanings from his expert research in ANE background very helpful in many respects, there are several points in the commentary, such as this one, where he seems so stuck on his “thing,” his specialty, that he’ll slay both good exegesis and common sense on its altar (to use ANE language, that is;).

Thoughts from Irenaeus on the Incarnation

It never fails. Tis the season to hear from every facet of the media, both local and national, attacks on the miraculous birth of our Savior and King. Inevitably, toward the end of most of the letters, columns, articles, or interviews, the author will make a vain attempt at consolation, concluding their drivel with Gnostic-like remarks about how one needn’t believe the reality and/or historicity of the event of the Incarnation to see the ‘real spiritual message and meaning.’
Hear this word from Irenaeus against the Gnostics of his day (...and ours as well):

“And, if one does not accept His birth from a virgin, how can he accept His resurrection from the dead? For it is no astonishing, nor marvelous or extraordinary thing if, without being born, He neither rose from the dead; moreover we cannot even speak of the resurrection of one who is unbegotten, since one who is unbegotten is also immortal, and one who has not undergone birth will neither undergo death—for one who has not had the beginning of a man, how is he able to assume his end? So, if He was not born, neither did he die; neither was He raised from the dead; and if he was not raised from the dead, death is not conquered nor its kingdom destroyed; and if death is not conquered, how are we to ascend to life, having fallen under death from the beginning?” (Demonstration on the Apostolic Preaching, 38—9)

Irenaeus got it right. For those who deny the time-space reality of the Incarnation, there is still a ‘real spiritual message and meaning’ left for us to hear, namely that we all remain “fallen under death from the beginning.”

So, as Christmas season rushes upon us, let us be all the more convinced of the hard, earthy realism of our most holy Faith, of the Incarnation of the Son of God. Who “made himself nothing, taking the form of a servant, being born in the likeness of men. And being found in human form, he humbled himself by becoming obedient to the point of death, even death on a cross” (Phil 2:7—8); the eternal One, who “became flesh and dwelt among us,” and so became the Self-same historical One (Jn 1:14). And let us, “being armed with the invulnerable doctrines of the faith, do battle against him (the devil) on behalf of the weak” (Justin, On the Resurrection, 1, read in full here), following in the steps of the Master whose appearing was to “destroy the works of the devil” (1 Jn 3:8)!